Sunday, November 10, 2013

A Note of Veterans Day Thanks To My Papa

For William Lewis Perdue Jr., Sgt., U.S. Army

Thank you Papa for being my Dad.

And on this veterans Day, thank you and all the members of "The Greatest Generation" for your WWII service in New Guinea and the Philippines.

And for the close calls and beach landings at Leyte Gulf, Mindanao and a lot of other places you told me about when I was small enough to sit on your knee and not understand the significance of what you said.

I do remember a lot of your stories, especially the one about being on a tanker ship made of concrete and loaded with so much gasoline that people trying to lighting up a cigarette was a bigger threat than Japanese submarines or aircraft.
Mama's handwriting on the back of this photo tells me that this photo of you is from 1942 shortly before you shipped out to a South Pacific ocean that was nothing like an Oscar and Hammerstein score.

Thank you for all that. And even though you died in 1985, thank you for your occasional vivid appearances in my dreams.

Love you Papa!

Your son,

Lewis

Some More Data And A Request To Readers Of This Post

The photo above is the only one I have of my father as a young man.

I'm grateful because it's a lot more than he had because his father abandoned him as an infant and disappeared. I do, however, have some idea of what his father looked like because my son William (named after Papa) looks more like him than I do.

I would, however, be grateful to correspond to anyone who knew him in the Army or in his early years. Ironic that we never ask the important questions while those we love are still present to answer them. Or perhaps it takes us years to understand the questions that we should ask.

All I know about his military service are the following two items:

An early photo of his entire U.S. Army Engineers unit -- taken at Camp Claiborne Louisiana -- is labeled as "Co B, Prime 361st Eng Reg SS"

Later on, after he was stationed in the South Pacific, the letters were addressed to the "759th Engr. Pts. Sup. Co"

If you knew him there ... or anywhere else ... I'd love to hear from you.

Lewis Perdue: Half A Century Trekking

Outdoorsman Lewis Perdue is a NYTimes best-selling author, entrepreneur, professor, prize-winning journalist and scientist who would always rather be pushing the limits in the middle of nowhere.

This is Lew in his own words:

"I've spent more than a half a century in the boonies:

From the swamps and woodlands of Mississippi to the Finger Lakes and Adirondacks of New York and the Appalachians and Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland and North Carolina. And Alaska from the Southeast to the bush and over to Canada's Yukon.

"And for the past 30+ years in the Sierras from The Sierra Madre to The Eastern Sierra and Lake Tahoe.

"I've been designing, hacking & perfecting gear for all seasons. And I still am.